We cook, We bake, We eat, We rate

Bagels 4 Ways

It was a Friday night, the start of a bank holiday weekend, Augustinas had his last day at his current job, we were going on holiday in a week’s time. Basically, we were in great spirits and we had our good friend (and old colleague of mine) Amy coming round for dinner. We thought about a few different options of what to cook, but eventually decided on bagels. It sounds pretty basic and maybe boring – but it’s actually a really nice social and tasty meal!

This is one of the first meals Augustinas and I made together and it’s such a nice way to eat with friends! You get together a load of fantastic ingredients, chop up some bagels and get creative. Once you’ve made them, you can cut them up, serve them on a wooden board or platter and share between everyone.

For these bagels we used plain seeded and chive & onion ones. It’s nice to have a mixture so you get lots of different flavours. First cut them all in half, and lie them on a tray with the soft dough side facing up. Warm them in the oven for a few minutes. Then lay them out and prepare to cover them in toppings!

We had a pretty eclectic and extensive list of ingredients, just so we could play around! It’s a good idea to stick to a cuisine’s palate. For example these ones were fairly Italian. We had olives, sundried tomatoes, capers, rocket, cheese, basil, cream cheese, fresh leafy greens, amongst other things. Our main spreads were pesto, chive cream cheese and a chutney.

Bagel #1:

– green pesto, chorizo (we grilled the chorizo for a few minutes first so it released some oil), sundried tomatoes, olives, basil leaves.

Bagel #2:

– chutney, turkey, gherkins, capers, fresh rocket and Parmesan. Sounds a bit of a weird combo but this one was actually my favourite!

Super easy to make. Chop up sweet potatoes (I find 1-2 per person makes a nice side portion) and coat them in a little oil, paprika, salt, pepper and any other spices you fancy! Mix them up so they are evenly coated and cook them at around 180c for half an hour or so. Use your initiative, sometimes they take longer to get nice and crispy!

Whilst the fries are cooking you can put together all your flavour combinations, put the bagels back together and get ready to feast!

Put the bagels in the oven at around 170c until they are toasty and your cheese is melted. Take them out, chop them up, serve on a board. Sprinkle with rocket to get that perfect insta shot 😉😂

We had it with a bottle of white wine for Amy, a bottle of red wine for me and beers for Augustinas – so apparently this meal goes with any type of booze 😁

It was such a perfect way to chill out, have fun and eat together.

Hope this gives you some ideas and something a bit different to try when having a casual dinner with friends!